Mark Me
by Querel
Summary: What's there left to do when you live in a dream bubble with nothing but the trappings of a teenage boy's bedroom? Develop a piercing fetish, that's what. Secondary Pairing #2 in Querel's Shipping Wall


_Hold still. Don't cry._

Tavros sat with his hands in his lap, waiting. It was the worst part of the whole thing, the waiting. Waiting was never any different, no matter how many times he'd gone through this ritual.

How often was it, really? Tavros began to wonder if there would ever be a stopping point. Two people, one needle, twenty fingers between them and plenty of metal to stud their skin, gray and peachy. Enough blood to spill between the both of them.

Tavros swallowed and clenched hands at the fabric of his pants. What came next? Really…. What _else_ could Strider want to stick that needle through? The troll sighed and fell back onto Dave's bed, unable to stand watching him any longer. He propped his feet up on the mattress and put his hands behind his head, closing his eyes. The sounds of Dave fiddling around with the surgical steel instruments still chimed in his head.

That and Dave's humming.

It was a recent habit of his. One that they both knew he picked up from Tavros but neither would speak of that fact. Tavros started singing back the lyrics that played from Dave's stereo in the moments where there was more or less nothing. Nothing but space to fill. Between the long verses of rapping and beat boxing, there'd be a melody for Tavros to latch onto. And he would sing it in the afterglows when Dave would nod off on the bed next to him.

Tavros couldn't sleep when Dave did. So he would sing instead. And there would be times when Dave would wake up to quiet and wavering murmurs of song snippets. So he'd hum them back.

Dave never sang. Not even under his breath. That was alright, though. Tavros was fine with the humming. It was low and smooth. Special. A rare thing that would always come out of nowhere and Tavros made sure to go silent every time he heard it. Because soon, it would be gone. And Dave would replace it with something else.

"Hold still," he would say in a voice just as low as that humming but not as sweet. "Don't cry."

In the back of his heart, Tavros felt the emptiness weigh on him. This was death. An existence in a memory. He had use of his legs back but eyes as blank as paper. He had a companion to spend time with but the absence of anything original to do but try and push the boundaries of how kinky their sex could get.

Only, they had this new hobby now. One that Tavros would actually admit he found interesting.

He'd never had a Kismesis before. A relationship built solely on rivalry, competition. One that highlighted the pleasure in pain. Honestly, it was a weak union. Tavros was the only one who saw it for what it really was. Dave called what they had a 'matter of convenience and that's really all there is to say about that shit.' Either way, hearts weren't really in it. Only the motions.

They flung insults at each other when boredom set in and there wasn't much call for gentleness or niceties. Just silence. Lack of voices and just the songs that played in the background. Tavros's singing. Dave's humming.

Kismesis…yeah right. They were just nothing. Nothing apart and when they came together they were nothing then too.

"I wanna do something different today."

Tavros opened his eyes as the bed dipped. Dave was crawling over him with his shirt already off, the needle in his fingers.

"What's that?" Tavros asked quietly.

"I wanna do this naked," Dave said, looking down at him through the shades. Tavros had gotten to the point where he could almost see straight through them, to the nothingness behind the lenses. The words did something to the emptiness he kept cradled inside. It hitched a spark and made this warmth spread. Signs that somewhere, they were doing something right. That burn was a good thing.

"Uh…why?"

"Because it'll make the happy ending easier. Get your pants off." Dave set the needle aside on the nightstand and unlatched his own belt as Tavros sighed and pulled at his zipper.

What was there left to do when you were dead? Maybe if Tavros had landed in a bubble with someone else, he would've actually managed to find some sort of consolation. Maybe some peace. Some closure. But not with this human who didn't talk. Not about things that hurt. Not about things he loved.

They didn't talk. Why talk when you could just fuck and not think?

Tavros shuffled his pants the rest of the way off and propped himself up on his elbows. One of his hands lifted to brush along the taut lines of Dave Strider's waist. He really was a beautiful human. Tavros couldn't deny that. Not the strange paleness of his freckled skin or the soft strands of his oddly yellow hair or the sweet bites from those dull teeth.

Beautiful all over.

"What are you, uh, piercing on me now?" Tavros asked him.

"Your tongue."

Tavros closed his eyes and breathed, feeling the heat and giving press of Dave settling his hips in the curve of Tavros's pelvis. Half-hard against his nook. Another breath. Dave leaned in when Tavros inhaled, as if pulled by it. His kiss landed at the tip of Tavros's nose, teeth slipping out to tug just a bit at the septum ring that hung there.

"Ouch," Tavros said gently.

"Open your mouth," Dave said, taking up the needle again, his hips pushing against Tavros as he did.

"Next, I'm gonna get those, uh, those weird pink nubs on your chest," Tavros muttered. The tip of his bulge slid out, fingering lightly at the length of Dave against him. The human made a soft sound and took a moment to rock his hips a little, coaxing a bit more length from them both.

"Be my guest," Dave said. Tavros opened his mouth, staring straight up into those shades. "Be still. Don't cry."

Tavros's pulse sped, as it always did in this moment. But instead of an intrusive pinch at his flesh, he felt only the warm slide of Dave's tongue into his mouth.

Dave liked to kiss Tavros like it was a question he had. What does this feel like? How does it taste? What's it like compared to…?

Yeah. Even though they didn't talk, Tavros knew who they weren't talking about.

That one. That other human. The one where Dave's kisses wouldn't be so open ended but would have their own answers.

Feels like warmth and happiness and darkness. Tastes like everything you love. There is no comparison.

Tavros hiccupped a bit, Dave's tongue still in his mouth, feeling along points of fangs and putting that salt-and-iron flavor along the inside of his lip. Never failed to cut himself.

"Are you crying?" Dave asked, pulling away, the hand without the needle holding Tavros's face.

"Am I?" Tavros asked. There was a stunted silence as Tavros wiped angrily at his cheeks, trying to shove the tears away. Then his heart screwed up inside his chest, tight and aching.

"Dave…I…I hate you." He pushed Dave's hand off of his jaw and wrapped his arms tight around the human's chest, pulling Dave down on top of himself.

"Whoa, whoa, what brought up this oxymoronic attitude display?" A chuckle. "Sounds like what you are, an oxy-moron."

"Shut up." Tavros knocked his forehead into Dave's shoulder and squeezed him a little tighter, the twine of his bulge retreating in the face of his sudden heartache. "I hate you…. I get that you…that you don't give a fuck about me. But…but you're all I have now. And it," he choked, "it makes my think pan just…it just warps…that we do stuff like this…. We hurt…we hurt each other…and we, w-we fill pails and it doesn't mean…_anything_."

And Tavros hated the silence. The inevitable quiet that always fell over them. That's what it always came back to. A whole bunch of nothing. With the sting of new piercings in skin that meant nothing. And songs in the background that meant nothing. Tavros would sing. Dave would hum. Nothing.

"Hey," Dave muttered, turning his head from where it landed in the crook of Tavros's neck. He reached up his fingers and muddled them through the strands of Tavros's mohawk. "I can only guess that you've been building up this mess for a while. We doing one of those feelings jams right now?"

"You're an idiot," Tavros told him.

"Yeah, go figure, it happens." Dave pushed himself up out of Tavros's grasp and picked up the needle from where it had fallen. "Open your mouth. Shut up; just do it and listen."

Tavros closed his eyes, feeling the hot stream of tears trickling down his face. He opened his mouth anyway, keeping still underneath Dave as he felt strong fingers steady his chin.

The shift of Dave's calves against the outside of Tavros's thighs was gentle, the returning press of his hips, heavy.

"Once upon a time," Dave said, "I lived in a world where I was going to die. And I didn't know it. And you can bet every nonexistent thing you own that I didn't think I would be the last one out. The very last one dead. But that's what happened."

Dave readjusted himself just a bit and put the point of the needle at the center of Tavros's tongue, pushing it in slowly. Tavros kept as still as he could, a noise of pain stifled at the back of his throat.

"Being alone sucks," Dave murmured. "Wouldn't wish that shit on anyone. And I thought that when I died, I'd find the end of everything. But here I am, in my bedroom, with a troll I'd barely known, a bunch of music and needles to pull through you." And he did pull it through. So slowly, making Tavros curl his tongue in a weird angle just to get the thin tube of metal through the wet muscle.

Slow and stinging. And when it was all the way through, Dave screwed the barbell in place with another stud. There were more watery brown tears; some got on Dave's fingers, salting the stickiness of the saliva that was there.

"You're a moron," Dave told him, touching the tip of his own tongue to the needle before setting it aside again. "But you're here. You've got soft insides and baby kisses and you sing like I need to hear. I ain't good with the whole 'bearing my soul' shit but you're the only one here to take the brunt of all the shit I'm carrying and I just can't unload all that on you. You don't need to worry about my flaws and fuckups."

Tavros wanted to speak. But his tongue was numb, swelling in his head. So he grabbed Dave's wrist and put that hand to his own neck, pressing Dave's fingers against his throat.

He tried.

"Where…agh…what hurts," Tavros said thickly, "share it. Make me feel."

Dave sighed and took his hand away.

"Sure, kid," he promised, fingers sliding down Tavros's throat, over his chest, all the way to the folds of his nookHe slid a few digits in carefully. "But I don't got it in me to hurt you for real."

Tavros moaned gently his hands coming up to grip at Dave's shoulders. "But…ah, but why do you…?" Those needles hurt. For real.

"It helps," Dave said, lowering his head a bit, "knowing that someone won't forget me. It's an addiction."

"You…won't forget…."

Dave looked up again, the slight pink of his cheeks obvious now to what Tavros could see. The troll shifted his hands and pulled Dave's sunglasses away, letting them fall beside the pillow. Blank eyes.

"Remember," Tavros whispered. He did his very best. Sometimes, if he tried hard enough, his eyes would come back. Dave mentioned it once. So he tried. And he knew it worked because Dave opened his mouth just a fraction and stroked long and slow at that sweet spot inside Tavros.

And then Tavros saw. For the first time in life or afterlife, he saw Dave Strider's eyes. As red as the blood in that human body and sharp as the needle he'd driven through Tavros's tongue.

"Won't forget me," Tavros said. He sniffled a little bit. The ache in his mouth and the pleasure that continually burst from the tips of Dave's fingers echoed back and forth to one another.

"No, prolly not," Dave whispered. He kissed. Not at Tavros's lips, but the tears on his face and the skin that hid beneath the locks of hair on his forehead. At the angle of Tavros's jaw and down his neck, over and over, while he pushed his fingers in and out, gently. Tavros's bulge slithered out again Dave let it curl around his hand, stroking at its side with his thumb.

"Dave…."

"Yeah?"

"I don't…," Tavros grimaced at the pain and then shuddered, jaw trembling, "I think I…uh, pity you instead."

"Make up your mind, won't you?"

Tavros grabbed Dave's shoulder a little tighter and tugged him to the side until he got the message and lay down. He took the needle from the nightstand and positioned himself, straddling Dave's hips, his bulge wrapping around Dave's erection and pumping gently. For a moment, they just rocked, staring into each other's eyes now that they had colors to gaze into.

But then Tavros put his hand on Dave's chest and leaned in.

"Don't stop," he whispered, moving so the head of Dave's cock just pushed past the dripping folds of his nook. "Cry when it hurts."

Tavros bent forward, pushing his hips back at the same time, and wrapped his lips around Dave's nipple, sucking lightly.

Dave arched up, his cock going deeper inside Tavros as he did. They both moaned gently, two tones of longing in quiet harmony. Tavros pulled his lips away, rolling his hips a little before taking the stud from his own eyebrow—long since healed—and slipping it into the hollow end of the needle.

He steadied himself on Dave's chest and for a moment, they were both still save for the gentle writhe of Tavros's bulge against Dave's thigh.

Tavros pushed the needle through the damp nub of Dave's nipple, glancing up at him when the metal pierced through the other side to watch the shrink of Dave's pupils. He pulled the needle through, leaving the jewelry behind, which he screwed the other bead onto.

"I can't cry, Tav," Dave laughed gently.

"Mmh."

Dave wrapped his hands around Tavros's hips and thrust up into him. Tavros's head fell back and he gasped, gaining a rhythm in his own downstrokes as he held tight to Dave's shoulders.

What were they now? A couple of dead fools, bloody for each other. One crying because he could think of nothing else. The other unable to. Or unwilling.

Tavros found Dave's words echoing in him, ringing from that deep part of himself that he couldn't name but loved. It made his happy; it glowed when they hurt each other. When they held each other this closely. Hold still, he would say….

_Hold still._

Don't move. Don't leave me. Don't forget.

_Don't cry._

Find joy. Find love. Find peace.

Tavros held it back as long as he could but the sob spilled over him. Out of his eyes and down his face, from his lips and all the way to his trembling jaw and shaking fingers.

Dave sat up and moved his hands, grabbing Tavros's thighs as he lifted and pushed the troll against the wall. Their hips rocked back and forth against each other, Dave's length pushing hard into Tavros's insides. Caramel colored mess slipped out of Tavros's nook, staining the paleness of Dave's thighs on its way to stain the sheets.

"Boy, you're so hot inside," Dave whispered, his tongue flicking the shell of Tavros's ear. Tavros moaned at the words, digging his claws into Dave's back as he held even tighter.

"Dave…Dave…," he cried over and over again, his tears soaking the warm column of the human's throat.

"Come hard for me," Dave said. He gave another shove up into Tavros and came himself with a breathless groan.

The muffled sound of Tavros's genetic material dripping all over the bed was hushed under the troll's gasping. His muscles clenched tight around Dave, pulling every drop of cum from him.

The panted, breaths layering over one another in a sort of airy cacophony. Then finally, Dave put Tavros down on the pillows and gathered the blankets up around him.

He looked down into Tavros's face, watching as the deep chocolate brown of his eyes began to fade.

Before they did, he bent and kissed him. A soft kiss. All lips, no tongue.

And when he pulled away again, the eyes were blank once more.

"Gonna stick the other one?" Dave asked him, lying down on top of the blankets by his side. He flicked a finger casually over the unmarred nipple on his chest. Tavros shook his head.

"I don't…," he caught his breath and shivered a bit, "have to be the only one…you remember." He swallowed a little. "You can't cry out loud. But you do anyway. I, uh…I can feel it in me."

Dave let out a sort of scoff, shaking his head a little.

"You're some weirdass angel, Tav," he told him, leaning in for another kiss. Tavros let it linger, putting his hands on Dave's face as he kissed him.

"One day, you'll learn how to cry again," Tavros told him. "And…and I'll be here for you, when you do."

Dave laughed again.

"I know you will, kid."

_Be still. Cry when it hurts._


End file.
